


white noise

by castironbaku



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-01
Updated: 2017-10-20
Packaged: 2018-12-22 12:36:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11967525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/castironbaku/pseuds/castironbaku
Summary: In this final stage of the war, Kaneki leads the ghouls and Hide leads the humans. Plans are made together, meals are shared, and peaceful dreams are difficult to come by. It's not supposed to be this hard to trust each other. Yet the wounds run so much deeper than they expect. Maybe bridges are best left burnt. Maybe not everyone deserves a happily ever after.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this is uh, a manifestation of my sleepless nights since Hide came back :')
> 
> please do consider [commissioning](http://www.katsuki-army.tumblr.com/comm) me!

Hide liked to think he’d gotten the better end of the bargain. Similar to how he’d weighed the pros and cons of going to Kamii University instead of Tokyo University, he’d drawn a crude chart on a piece of scrap paper. On the top of it, he’d written “Surviving through Shit Times: The Pros and the Cons.” It had taken him about three weeks to fill the chart out to his satisfaction and shortly after he’d gotten discharged from the hospital, he pocketed it and went on his merry way as a man unknown, unnamed, and unmarked by any official record. 

Living off the grid had been nice, until he realized that absolutely nothing was going to happen unless he did something about it. He wished people could be better at their jobs or their appointed roles, so that he didn’t have to get involved anymore. He hated his restlessness. Part of him, as always, itched to be a part of things, despite his common sense telling him that next time a hungry ghoul had him alone in the sewers, he wouldn’t be as lucky. He just wasn’t the type to sit around and wait for the world to figure out what to do. He just didn’t have the patience for that.

Maybe that was why, when the meeting to decide the next course of action was starting to drag a little, he scribbled a five-phase plan on his sketchbook and strode over to center stage. While everyone studied and debated his proposal, he resisted the urge to make a joke at their expense. He tore off the page with the plan on it and put it in Marude’s hands who raised his eyebrows at him. A few people noticed him heading for the door, but most of them were busy arguing.

He left the room without letting anyone get a word in edgewise. Everyone was too much on edge ever since the last siege. They’d lost a lot of good people that night and the stakes had never been higher than now.

Lost in a relentless sea of his own thoughts, he wandered out onto the battlements, dismissing a couple of scouts to the other end. He needed time alone and besides, he could handle this end himself. He sat on the stone wall, legs dangling over the edge, hundreds of feet above the shadowy grounds below. He crossed his arms over his chest and watched the dying embers of a town the enemy had razed to the ground to scare them into submission. If he closed his eyes and listened hard enough, he thought he could hear people wailing, children crying, and wood splintering into black ash.

“Is this seat taken?”

He opened his eyes and the sounds of death and destruction faded from his ears. Kaneki hopped lithely onto the wall next to him and swung his legs over the edge. 

Hide raised his hands and signed, ‘ _You didn’t even wait for my answer.’_

Kaneki’s eyebrows knitted together as he slowly figured out what Hide was trying to say (they were both still beginners at this sign language stuff). Then he shrugged. “You wouldn’t be out here if you were waiting for anyone else.”

Hide eyed him, then turned back to the town half a mile away. It felt so much closer than that. Forget the wailing; he could _smell_ the acrid odor of burning flesh. Grimacing, he signed, ‘ _What makes you think I was waiting for_ you?’

“Nothing, really,” Kaneki admitted. “More of a gut feeling. Who else would you be waiting for anyway?”

Hide punched him in the shoulder. Kaneki let him. ‘ _Don’t make me sound so pathetic. Just because you’re Mister One-Eyed King and I’m just Mister Terrorist doesn’t mean I have a tinier social network than you.’_

_“_ So who _are_ you waiting for then?”

Hide pressed his fingers into his eyeballs, sighing. _‘I was waiting for you.’_

“It’s shouldn’t be that hard to admit. We’re best friends, right?” Kaneki smiled—a bit ruefully—rested his elbows on his thighs and laced his fingers together between his knees. “We haven’t talked in months. This war started when we were eighteen, nineteen, give or take. Now we’re, what, twenty seven?”

_‘I’m twenty eight. You’re twenty seven.’_

“More or less,” Kaneki said, barely suppressing another smile. “We’ve been through a lot of shit. We’ve changed a lot, in more ways than one.” 

That particular comment hung in the air between them for a while. Hide knew what Kaneki was talking about. When Touka died protecting their son two years ago, the loss would have broken Kaneki completely had it not been for Hide and the kid. Now he was a smidgeon less cynical about life, whereas Hide had only grown more and more distant. In a shocking turn of events, they’d switched roles, with Hide being the overtly suspicious one who preferred solitude to company and Kaneki being his sole source of encouragement—besides Marude and Saiko, of course.

“You know you can always talk to me right, Hide?” Kaneki tried to catch Hide’s eye, but Hide evaded his gaze. 

Hide grit his teeth. He was starting to regret this. Maybe trying to bring back what they used to be was a bad idea. Maybe it was better that they drifted apart. After all, did they really have need for each other beyond tactical advantage? Kaneki had his faction and Hide had his. Technically, their interaction was a formality and a requirement more than anything else. And with Kaneki so close… Hide took a minute to calm his breathing. 

_‘Don’t make this harder than it has to be, Kaneki,’_ he signed wearily. The ghostly aches and pains in his head and his body would plague him for hours after this. But Kaneki didn’t need to know that. It was hard enough trying to get the guy to take a hint. _’I told you stuff like that doesn’t have a place here.’_

Something flashed behind Kaneki’s eyes—bright and sharp as a knife fresh from the whetstone. But it subsided. He sighed heavily, his breath clouding the chilly night air. “I just want to know if you’re okay. I want us to be on the same page again. I used to ask myself what I would’ve done if you hadn’t ‘died.’ What I could’ve done right.”

Hide scoffed. _‘This is exactly what I mean. We can’t afford to think about things like that. This isn’t a soap opera, Kaneki. This is war.’_

“You think I don’t know that?” Kaneki’s gaze bore into him. “I know we don’t have time to go back and pretend we’re still normal college freshmen trying to figure shit out. I know that. I never thought there’d be harm in trying.” He coughed a little into his palm and raised his head up to the night sky. He, like Hide, probably noticed the wind was picking up. It pushed the hair from his forehead, making him look a bit older than he was. “It’s getting kind of cold,” he said “I’m going ahead.” He slipped off the wall, landing with catlike grace on his feet. 

By this time, Hide was barely hanging on to consciousness. The scars on his body weren’t scars anymore. They were open wounds again, like gaping mouths all over his body screaming in pain. Unknowingly, Kaneki was driving him over the edge of sanity just by being there. He gripped the edge of the battlement he sat on and when he was sure Kaneki was gone, he slunk inside, found his bedroom, and locked the door.

Then he crawled into a corner and weathered the excruciating agony alone, biting back screams, and letting the hours drag themselves past, counting every tear that dripped like blood onto his feet.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the angst continues

Every afternoon Hide made it a point to stroll around the grounds of their base of operations, making sure that everything was in order. Sometimes Saiko accompanied him on these walks. Today he was alone as he made his rounds. She was on a reconnaissance mission elsewhere. He didn’t want to admit it—because if he did, it would mean he had little faith in her ability—but he was anxious for her to come back in one piece. He didn’t want to lose anyone else in this stupid war.

_You don’t think that way,_ whispered a voice in his head. _You_ like _this, don’t you? You like being in control and you like it when you’re in the thick of things. You like when everything goes your way. Face it, Hide, you fucking_ love _this war._

Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. He wasn’t in the mood to indulge the voices in his head. He’d managed to ignore them for most of the past few years and he wasn’t about to let this be the first time he listened to them. So he walked on, from the armory to the pantry, inside the makeshift bunkers, out into the stockaded enclosure hidden in the woods that they used for training and keeping prisoners. After two and a half years here in this foreign country, they had managed to capture at least four important enemy strongholds. There was only one remaining—the most dangerous of them all—nestled in the heart of the capital.

He had to hope that training their troops in the woods was good enough as preparation for city fighting. It’d been two years since they’d seen urban warfare. They needed every opportunity to get ready. Every second spent fruitlessly was a second that the enemy used against them.

On this fine Wednesday morning, he had been expecting Kaneki to be in the main fortress, debriefing recon teams that had returned last night. Needless to say, Hide had been unpleasantly surprised to see Kaneki _not_ debriefing at the main fortress and instead sparring with, surprisingly, Hinami. She wasn’t usually here at this time. Then again, neither was Kaneki.

Kaneki paused as Hide approached, lowering his hands a bit. “Good m—“ He was cut off by a fist to the jaw. He went flying and hit the damp ground hard. He groaned, rolling over to his side, and Hinami yelped, “Oh my god! I’m so sorry!” She hurried over to him and offered to help him up. He shook his head and got on his feet.

“I’m okay, thank yo— _agh_ ,” he winced and inhaled sharply through his teeth, fingers moving to his reddened cheek. “Ow. God. Hinami, were you trying to dislocate my jaw? Because you did.”

She preened under the praise but still maintained her concern. “I thought you would dodge that one,” she said, smiling meekly. “But you got a little… distracted.” Turning to Hide, she said cheerily, “Good morning!”

Hide waved and flashed her a tiny smile. He pulled out his trusty pen and notepad from his back pocket and scribbled, _‘I hope you didn’t forget to eat on your way down here.’_

“We had breakfast.”

_’What exactly did you have for breakfast?’_

“Um. Rations?”

Hide raised a skeptical brow. Everyone knew how much of a stickler he was for a proper diet. In his defense, he simply didn’t want any of his troops to drop unconscious from ulcers or kidney stones right in the middle of the battlefield. Unfortunately, not a lot of them shared his passion for precaution.

“I should _really_ get some ice for that bruise, don’t you think?” Hinami said abruptly, looking pointedly at Kaneki’s face. Then without another word she darted off, disappearing beyond the stockade. Hide sighed audibly and tucked his pen and notepad back into his pocket.

“She’ll be fine,” Kaneki assured him. The bruise on his cheek was already well on its way to healing completely. It was like he’d never gotten punched in the face. He brushed the dirt from his pants and dragged a hand across his sweat-slicked forehead. His skin glistened in the morning sunlight. “She had more than just the rations. I made sure of it.”

Hide hummed, unimpressed. _‘And you? If you get sent back to the medical unit, don’t forget that I warned you not to touch the meat patties.’_

“I know my own limits, Hide. You don’t need to remind me every day,” Kaneki said, rolling his shoulders back twice. “I’m going to shower and change. Do you have time after that?”

_‘To talk?’_

“Yeah.”

_‘No. Tell me what you want to say now.’_ Then Hide paused. _‘Tell me over a round of one on one. You and me.’_

Kaneki’s eyebrows shot up. “Me? And… you? Sparring?”

Hide shot him a dark look that he hoped his scarred features enhanced. _‘It’s not the first time we’ve gone at it,’_ he signed, a little annoyed. _‘I don’t suppose you’re worried I can’t keep up?’_

“No, I’m not,” Kaneki protested, but Hide was already pulling his jacket off and tossing it to the nearest soldier who caught it with fumbling hands. “Hide, I’m not sure this is a good idea—not after last time—“ He fell silent when Hide leveled a glare on him. A voice in Hide’s head whispered that this was far from the best idea. As always, Hide ignored it.

They circled each other, trying to hazard guesses about what the other would do first. Hide had a feeling Kaneki would unconsciously go easy on him, just because of some buried feeling of guilt or because of his ruined face. The thought almost infuriated him, but then Kaneki swung a well-aimed roundhouse at his head. He brought his right arm up just in time to deflect the kick. 

He didn’t know when the visions started melting into his reality, but somewhere in the midst of trading kicks and punches, the training field around them would turn black as night and Kaneki’s expression would transform into something feral. Then things would look normal again. They were like flashes of lightning, there one second and gone the next.

Hide ducked, tried to land a punch on Kaneki’s throat, but was thwarted with a knife-hand block. With a muffled attempt at a swear word, he dropped and swept his leg in an arc to take Kaneki’s feet out from under him. But Kaneki was ready for it, flipping away from Hide on a backhand spring.

Hide jumped to his feet and Kaneki put his hands on his hips. “Hide, I’m serious, this isn’t a good id—“

_‘Shut up and fight_ ,’ Hide wanted to say, but couldn’t. The stink of Tokyo’s sewer system threatened to make him vomit. He could feel the water up to his legs. He could see Kaneki, panting, covered in his own blood and fragmented kakuja.

He launched himself at Kaneki in what he knew was a reckless move. Luckily, Kaneki didn’t expect it. Soon they were tumbling over each other on the ground, exchanging and parrying blows, throwing up dirt and grass as they went. This time, Kaneki seemed to have trouble getting his bearings back after getting caught off guard. Hide grabbed Kaneki’s wrist, meaning to twist it behind him to take him down. It was almost too easy. 

It was.

In less than a second, Kaneki had Hide on his back, pinned to the ground with his knee on Hide’s chest. Only Hide was breathing hard. Kaneki wasn’t even sweating more than he already was. Sunlight haloed his pale hair and he watched Hide with concern but in Hide’s eyes he was still awash in viscera, his maw dripping with saliva.

_Thanks for the meal_ , the bloodied version of Kaneki said with a wide grin.

With unprecedented force and a garbled scream, Hide forced Kaneki off of him and scrambled to his feet. It was too hard to breathe. He bent over and retched but no vomit came out. Kaneki was at his side in an instant.

_‘Leave,’_ Hide signed in disoriented, slightly frantic motions. _‘Please.’_

Kaneki took one step, then two steps back, but barked orders for a pair of soldiers to escort Hide back to his room and for someone to get a doctor from the medical unit immediately. Hide bore it all silently, his eyes closed, trying to separate hallucination from reality. 

He used to be apathetic to appearances. He didn’t care if he looked like shit to everyone else, so long as he felt comfortable in his own skin. But now he didn’t know what that even felt like. 

As he left, he vaguely thought to ask Kaneki what he’d wanted to say. Challenging him to a sparring match without letting him say his piece, Hide realized that he’d been nothing less than a total sack of shit. Hallucinations and voices weren’t excuses.

He turned on his heel, an apology waiting in his throat, but all he saw in front of him was the door to his room. He was back and he was alone. He hadn't even realized it. Dropping his head into his hands, he sucked in a breath.

“Gghm eag urgguhii yghd.”

_I’m a motherfucking idiot._


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one took a while, but it still hurt a lot

Hide’s spy was due at half past midnight, at a town about two and a half miles down the road. Hide had wanted to go alone—he was perfectly capable of gathering intel by himself, it really wasn't that hard—but Kaneki had flat-out refused. It was either a trusted member of their inner circle went with him, or Kaneki went himself. Naturally, this led to a long and drawn-out argument because if either one of them died, the war would be set up for a bloody years-long extension. Theirs was not a hydra-like organization. You cut one head off, another one will take too long to grow in its place.

Because Kaneki was being so difficult about it, Hide decided to sneak off on his own. He just couldn’t be bothered with details like risk and protection. Doing it like this was simply the more efficient choice. He told himself this over and over as he shouldered his knapsack for the journey. There was no point in Kaneki coming along because 1) he would try to make awkward conversation, or 2) he would probably kill someone by accident, or 3) both. If anything, Kaneki was excellent at stiff smiles and manslaughter. Oh, what Hide would give for him to be the timid bookworm he used to be.

He slunk away from their base at eleven, moving as quickly as he could without alerting anyone to his presence—or absence. The beaten, unpaved path leading to town was clear of passersby, which was not unusual for this hour and in the middle of a war. Still, he kept his wits about him. He couldn’t stick to the path for long though, for the sake of unpredictability. He abandoned it halfway through the journey and started to pick his way through the thick wood. It was slower, but he was less visible this way.

At about eleven fifty, Hide realized that he wasn’t alone. He cursed inwardly. How long had he been followed? Why did he only notice now? He kept going, pretending like he didn’t know about the person tailing him, and carefully slipped a hand into his jacket. Up ahead, he noticed a small clearing. Perfect. He wanted as much maneuverability as possible when he pulled the knife on his unwanted guest. Although, he had to hope that they didn’t have a gun on them.

He stopped at the edge of the clearing. If he could talk properly, he’d have called them out by now, but instead he slid the switchblade out of his inner jacket and held it aloft: a clear threat. 

A twig snapped and leaves crunched under someone’s foot and suddenly in the dim moonlight, Kaneki appeared with his hands raised. “Sorry,” he said, but his expression wasn’t sorry at all. “I couldn’t help it. I was worried.”

Hide closed his eyes, lowering the switchblade. He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed heavily. Of course this would happen. Of course Kaneki would end up following him to the exchange anyway. Most of him felt exhausted, though a part of him remained much too sensitive. With Kaneki here, his attention would be split between keeping up appearances and trying to stay sane enough for that.

He tucked the switchblade back into his jacket. _‘Well, since you’re here, watch our backs. We both need to get home by morning in one piece.’_

Kaneki brightened visibly, both thrilled and relieved that Hide hadn’t told him to go back. They soldiered onward, following the path but never walking on it, as quickly and quietly as possible. Hide had almost never gone on a mission with Kaneki, especially not anything like this. Sneaking around to gather intel was something they’d always done separately, not with each other. He found himself all too aware of Kaneki’s every move, studying him and stowing that information away in his mind. Old habits died hard.

Upon reaching the outskirts of town, Hide dragged Kaneki in the direction of what he hoped was an empty barn. It was far from empty. The floor was covered in hay, bales of which were stacked neatly in the back. Farming tools—pitchforks, sickles, hoes—lined one wall. A lone wheelbarrow sat forlornly next to the bales of hay. In the day, this might have looked almost tranquil. But at night, in the pale light of the moon, it looked incredibly lonely.

Hide didn’t have the time to wax poetic about the inside of a barn though. He shrugged off his knapsack and dropped to a squat, rummaging through its contents. He pulled out a few clothes and handed them to Kaneki. 

“Uh…” Kaneki held up the blouse and the accompanying skirt with a bewildered look on his face. In another life, the sheer absurdity of it and what was going to happen would’ve made Hide laugh like there was no tomorrow. Kaneki lowered the blouse. “What am I supposed to do with these?”

_‘As far as I know, clothes are meant to be worn,’_ Hide signed with a dismissive air. _‘So put them on.’_

It was painfully obvious that Kaneki had serious doubts about whatever Hide had planned, but it was also equally obvious that he wasn’t willing to argue. He started to change. Hide held out a hand for Kaneki’s clothes to stuff in his knapsack.

“Did you bring make-up?” Kaneki asked as he pulled the blouse over his head, mussing up his hair a little. He’d meant this as a joke, but Hide was perfectly serious when he brought out lipstick, powder, and a compact mirror. Kaneki blanched. “Really?”

_‘It’s dark, so you won’t have to put on too much anyway. In a way, it’s actually good that you came along—I wouldn’t know what to do with these. I was just going to wing it, sort of.’_

Kaneki accepted the make-up reluctantly. “You know, I’m all for doing whatever it takes to win this war, but I never thought it’d mean I’d have to do this again.”

_‘Sasako was a good look for you.’_

“Half of me knows you’re being sarcastic, but I’m taking that as a compliment.”

_‘Oh, wait. Before you start.’_ He reached into the knapsack. _‘Don’t forget your hair.’_

 

There was logic behind Hide’s choice to make Kaneki take on the full disguise. First off, Kaneki’s was a face that most, if not all, of the enemy knew well. It’d been plastered on the Internet, on physical posters, and thus had stuck perfectly within their minds. Hide, on the other hand, was more forgettable—one of many advantages to working behind the scenes.

The disguise had therefore been less of a necessity and more of a failsafe to Hide. With Kaneki here, there was no conceivable way they could enter the town without him in any sort of disguise. Hide settled on wearing a face mask. He normally wore one, though not recently.

As expected of a town nestled within a war zone, soldiers patrolled the area with the strictest vigilance and the streets were devoid of any civilians. The goal was to minimize their exposure, so they slunk through narrow alleyways and stuck to the darkest parts of town. Their destination was an inn doubling as a haven for refugees displaced by the war. Surprisingly, only one soldier stood at attention by the door. Hide saw him stifle a yawn as they approached.

“Good evening,” Kaneki said in his most devastatingly female voice and best attempt at the local language. “My husband and I… we’ve been traveling for an entire day on foot. We’re headed for the city; we would take a car, but ours was commandeered for the war effort. Could we find a place here to stay the night?”Hide thought he was laying it on a bit too thick but the soldier himself didn’t seem to notice.

He gave them a once-over and held out a hand. “Papers,” he said in a gruff yet bored tone. Hide made a show of going through his knapsack for his and Kaneki’s (Sasako’s) documentation. He had come fully prepared for this scenario, thankfully. He handed the documents over and the soldier flipped through them with less attention than he should have given.

After a couple of minutes, he looked up at Hide and pointed to his own jaw. “Are you sick? I need to see your face to verify your identity.”

“He’s—” Kaneki bit his lip. He wasn’t sure what to say. The officer would still have Hide remove his mask regardless. Hide put a hand on his arm, squeezing it. 

_‘I’m taking it off,’_ Hide signed, to which the officer narrowed his eyes suspiciously, but once the mask came off, he looked immediately apologetic. Kaneki didn’t even need to say a thing. The soldier simply nodded, folded the documents and returned them. He gave way for the “couple.”

Inside, Hide put the mask back on. He could feel Kaneki’s eyes on him, but he ignored it. There were things he needed to do. Although… 

_‘I wasn't expecting you'd still be that good at acting,’_ he signed and went ahead to search for their contact before Kaneki could say anything in reply.

As per their agreement, he found a vacant seat next to the fire. He sat next to a weary-looking woman with a mug of hot soup in her hands and a thick blanket around her shoulders. Kaneki took a position by the bar behind Hide, and placed an order for two. For a while, no one said anything. The only sounds came from the crackling fire and the soft snores of refugees camped out on the chairs and on the floor. Others, who were awake and drinking, exchanged news from outside of town in hushed tones. A small television was on, and mutely reported the status of the war.

“Would you like something warm to drink?” the woman said suddenly. She offered him her mug. “Don’t worry… I’ve had my share.”

Hide nodded gratefully and took the mug. He felt the shape of a small, square USB pressed against his palm as he did. He looked up at the woman, but she was already leaning against the arm of the chair, pulling the blanket tight around her body as she settled in to sleep. Hide quietly contemplated the mug of soup, surreptitiously sliding the USB into his pocket. Then he took the mug to the bar and sidled up next to Kaneki.

“You tired?” Kaneki asked. He didn’t ask about the exchange but Hide was sure he was just saving the question for later, when they were in safer territory.

_‘A little.’_

“I got you something to drink,” he said, “but it looks like I was beaten to the punch.”

Hide chuckled softly—it was still a rather grotesque noise; he tried not to laugh often these days so that he wouldn’t scare anyone off, but Kaneki didn’t look bothered in the slightest. In fact, he looked relieved to hear Hide’s laughter. He had two mugs in his hands. Hide took one.

_‘I’m kind of hungry after all that sneaking around,’_ Hide explained.

Kaneki’s expression turned a bit dark. He leaned in and murmured, “Are you sure you can trust her? We don’t know if she’s turned on us too.”

_Too._ The word was harsh, but true. It wouldn’t be the first time they were betrayed. Hide shook his head. He’d studied the mug earlier—he hadn’t seen or smelled anything out of the ordinary. Of course, if it were a tasteless, colorless poison, he would be done for. But he’d also seen the look in the woman’s eyes. She was tired—tired of the war, of the deaths, the suffering. She was desperate for it to end. And for that she entrusted her efforts to Hide.

_‘She wouldn’t lie.’_

“How do you know?”

_‘Just a feeling.’_

Kaneki opened his mouth, closed it, and pursed his lips. Then he sighed. “Can we at least compromise? Just half. Only half of it.”

Hide rolled his eyes. _‘Fine.’_

He picked up the woman’s mug and lowered his mask, hooking it around his chin. Then he put the mug to his lips. The soup was warm, thick, and delicious, with bits of meat and vegetables here and there. It slid down his throat and filled his stomach with a pleasant heat that spread throughout his body. Kaneki was watching him intently, and anxiously. Hide raised the mug and smiled. 

_‘It’s good.’_

He had another mouthful and for a moment, if he just ignored the fact that dozens of displaced refugees were trying to get some sleep around him and the fact that the news on the TV just wouldn’t get any better, he thought that this reminded him of his years back home. Of nights spent with a friend, reading comics and listening to American music from the early 00’s. Of early morning bike rides to class and late afternoon coffee. And then the long lonely months when all he had to keep him company were newspaper clippings, TV news, his notes, and a mind that kept him awake until late into the night to piece together when, why, and how this whole mess started.

He’d missed this peace. He’d missed Kaneki so badly that he’d had to swallow the pain in order to get anything done right. But now his memories were tainted with nightmares and he knew only too well that nothing would ever be the same between them ever again. They could pretend now, for a few hours, that not a day had passed since everything went wrong. And after that? He didn’t know.

How ironic it was that this very war was the only time they could act their parts as best friends—brothers-in-arms—and that when it ended, they would certainly go their separate ways. If they survived. Kaneki probably didn’t know this, or think it. He likely thought that once this was all over, they’d go home and live happily ever after.

Hide drained the mug Kaneki gave him and stared at the half-empty one from the woman. _‘Let’s leave at dawn,’_ he signed. _‘I want to get some shut-eye.’_

“Okay,” Kaneki said. “I’ll stay here and keep watch of things.”

Hide smiled slightly. _‘Can’t sleep?’_

Kaneki returned the smile. “There’s too much going on. I can’t calm down until we get back.”

_‘Stay with me then.’_

His eyebrows shot up. “What?”

_‘Stay with me,’_ Hide repeated. _‘Tonight. Just for a while.’_

“Why?”

Hide pondered that for a moment. Why, indeed? Maybe he didn’t think he could sleep alone. Or maybe he needed Kaneki to stay awake next to him, just so they could up and run away together if something went awry. But he knew all too well that none of the was true. Still, he wasn't sure why he answered Kaneki as honestly as he did.

_‘I think I want to pretend for a while longer.’_


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i remembered some friends over at the hide discord server talking about hide as the "deuteragonist." this word has stuck with me for a while and showed up in my thoughts a lot as i wrote this.
> 
> for people like me who had to google what this means:  
> deuteragonist - the person second in importance to the protagonist in a drama

“So you slept together. And then what happened? Did he confess his undying love, or did you?”

_‘Don’t sit on the ammunition, Saiko. I won’t be responsible for you being blown to bits.’_

She shot Hide a sour look from where she sat, atop a crate aptly labelled “Dangerous Material; Handle with Care,” and slid off of it reluctantly. She then stood shoulder to shoulder with Hide and looked over his notepad, where he was scribbling away the inventory. 

“You know you don’t have to keep checking the lists every day,” she said. “We have routine checks and lots of people do that. You have better things to do.”

He eyed her for a moment, then turned his attention back to his notes. She was right, of course, that there were men and women who made sure that everything in the base was in order and everyone had enough of everything. He couldn’t help it. He hated sitting through hour-long strategy meetings. He preferred being out there, on the ground, _doing_ something, yet the opportunities for him to prowl around for information were few and far in between. As much as he disliked it, he was needed _here_.

_‘Things like what?’_

“Like telling me what happened between you and Maman!” Saiko threw up her hands in exasperation. “Sometimes you’re harder to talk to than he is. And not because you can’t actually talk.”

_‘Nothing happened, okay?’_ he signed tiredly. _‘We were next to a family of refugees. I was the only one asleep. He stayed awake. It was only for an hour.’_

“Nothing?” Saiko repeated, dismayed.

Hide nodded. _‘Nothing.’_ He paused. _‘Although I didn’t have any of my usual nightmares.’_

“Huh.” She looked like this was a vital piece of information she had to wrap her head around completely. “But did you _want_ something to happen?”

_‘Like what?’_ he asked again.

She clapped a hand to her forehead. “You know what? Never mind. How are the plans for Phase 3 moving along?”

Hide felt himself relax. Thank god she had given up on the topic. Hide himself didn’t have any answers to his own questions about what had happened that night (which was to say, nothing) and he had yet to understand what had made him want to feel Kaneki’s warmth, his pulse, and steady breathing next to him as he slept—when for the past few years Kaneki had been nothing but bad news for his mental stability.

_‘Everything’s working out smoothly. Provided we don’t get delayed, we can start moving in on the city in about a month.’_

“A month?” she echoed, eyes wide. “And after that?”

_‘After that…’_ Hide smiled. _‘After that, the war is over.’_

Saiko exhaled audibly. She’d wanted to hear that just as much as the next person. Hide liked to think that he wholeheartedly agreed with the sentiment. It’d taken several years and countless lives to get to this point. Failure was simply not an option.

“Um, am I bothering something important?”

Both Saiko and Hide turned to see Kaneki standing awkwardly in the doorway. Neither of them had noticed him there. It made Hide remember the times when he would sneak up behind Kaneki as he read a book. Now things were the other way around most of the time. It was nothing major, but it unnerved Hide how even the littlest details about their dynamic had completely switched.

Saiko bounded over to Kaneki with a huge smile on her face. She’d held nothing resembling a grudge since he’d left the Quinx and had been branded a traitor, even though she’d admitted to Hide that it had deeply wounded her. Or maybe he was jumping the gun in thinking that betrayals always led to bitterness.

“We were just doing inventory!” she said cheerily.

_‘You mean_ I _was doing inventory,’_ Hide signed drily.

“Don’t listen to him, Maman,” said Saiko. “I did fifty percent of the work.”

_‘More like zero percent.’_

Kaneki chuckled. “Well aren’t you two energetic at nine in the morning.”

Saiko made a face at him. “Are you trying to say something about our sleeping patterns again?” 

“Maybe,” he said with a mischievous smirk. “Oh, before I forget. Hide, can I have a moment?”

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary—Kaneki asked Hide for private discussions all the time—and yet something about the intensity behind his eyes made Hide falter before nodding. He glanced at Saiko, but if she noticed anything, she didn’t let on. In fact, she seemed to jump at the chance to leave. 

“I’ll be in the mess hall if you need me,” she said and waved goodbye. In less than a minute, Hide and Kaneki were alone for the umpteenth time in a week. Really, it was nothing unusual. Co-leaders always needed time to strategize together. But the silence was so awkward it couldn’t be anything _but_ strange. Things hadn’t really been the same since their last “mission” together. If Hide could clear his throat, he would have. Instead he moved his hands in the way that people did when they didn’t know what to do with them.

_‘So… do you need anything?’_

Stupid question. Why would Kaneki want to talk to him if he didn’t need anything? 

“Yes… and no.” Kaneki shifted from one foot to the other. Indicative of the uneasiness he felt. “Can we talk somewhere else? Maybe have some food while we’re at it?”

_‘Sure.’_

Hide followed Kaneki reluctantly out of the room and down the hall. It took them a while, but Kaneki managed to lead the way up a winding staircase and into a room on the top floor of an observation tower. He dismissed the two soldiers in the room. He sat on one of the chairs at the window that had a clear view of the path that led into the fortress. Hide frowned.

The truth was, he had never actually approved of this station. It was rudimentary security when they already had cameras positioned throughout the place. Putting soldiers on duty here was a waste of resources and time. They were already tight on both. But Kaneki had nevertheless insisted and his word was law. Most of the time.

“I’d offer to make coffee,” Kaneki said as Hide sat down next to him. “Just like the old days. But we don’t have beans to grind or anything to grind them with.”

Hide didn’t trust himself to reply, and so he didn’t. He was, however, able to smile somewhat which let Kaneki relax a little.

“I brought some sandwiches though,” he said, pulling a paper bag from inside his jacket. “Made them myself.”

_‘How do they taste?’_

“You tell me.”

Hide took one sandwich and bit into it. The bread was dry and tasteless, but the meat in between was cooked well and seasoned to perfection. He flashed Kaneki a thumbs-up. 

“Thank god it’s edible,” Kaneki sighed in relief. He rested the heels of his palms on the edges of his chair as Hide ate his sandwich. It was a drawn-out silence but a comfortable one. By now they were no strangers to silence. Sometimes, silence was the way they talked at all. But someone would have to break it eventually. When they were younger it’d been Hide. Now? Now it was Kaneki. And it always would be Kaneki until the day they died.

“Do you remember,” he said, “that one time when we were kids, and we went on this field trip to Enoshima?”

_‘When I stepped on a sea urchin? God. Don’t make me remember that.’_ It was traumatizing. Just thinking about it made Hide’s foot ache.

Kaneki laughed. “Yeah, that. You put on this brave face and you said, ‘Is that all you got?’ to a sea urchin. A _sea urchin_. But I knew you were trying hard not to cry. And a few seconds later, you were bawling.”

Hide rolled his eyes skyward. _‘You’re conveniently leaving out the part where you pushed me. That’s why I even stepped on it in the first place.’_

“ _You_ were sticking a starfish to my cheek!”

_‘You were overreacting! They’re adorable.’_

“Not when their tube feet are rubbing against my flesh.” 

Hide snorted—or tried to—and signed, _‘Seriously, though. What are you trying to get at here?’_

Kaneki’s smile faded a little. Just a little bit. But in more ways than one, it felt as if it was still there. The crinkle in the corner of his eye. The lift in his cheeks. The careless sweep of his fringe against his forehead, just barely touching his eyebrows. As usual, Kaneki looked the part of a saint. Virgin and untouched. The only thing that spoiled it was the deep, weary loneliness in his eyes. He was the statuesque image of Death itself.

“I’ve missed you,” he said at last. “We haven’t talked in so long, I start to forget what it’s like.”

_‘We just talked yesterday,’_ Hide pointed out. _‘And two days before that.’_

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

_‘No. I don’t.’_

Kaneki’s eyes were on him and he was caught. He wondered if this is what Touka felt like the first time she saw Kaneki again, and not Sasaki. This trance, he knew, drove people to madness. It’d caught not only Touka, but Tsukiyama and thousands other ghouls that now blindly followed him. If you let it have you, you were sentenced to love him until death do you part. 

“I’d never once pegged you as the dense idiot in this story,” Kaneki said quietly. “You were always the one who was one step ahead of the plot. In any book, you would’ve been the last one standing. Not me." He paused, a bitter smile on his saintly face. "It was never supposed to be me.”

Hide’s heart was beating so hard he could hear nothing but the throb in his ears. In all honesty, he was terrified. This was the part when he broke down and reality became distorted and dreams took over, to fill in the gaps in his memory. This was what he hated Kaneki for, loathed him for with all his being. 

He hated how Kaneki could drive him crazy with a single smile.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” - Albus Dumbledore

Kaneki and Hide’s army made their first move upon the capital with little to no delay. Everything was proceeding smoothly—so much so in fact, that Kaneki was getting suspicious. He paced up and down the length of his tent, as Hide watched him with an expressionless stare. Dressed in full-armor, Kaneki looked ready to tear apart the nearest threat within a ten mile radius. But it was ten in the evening. The day’s battles were over and the troops had settled in a grassy field next to the charred remains of a once prosperous farming village.

“Something’s happening,” Kaneki said for what felt like the hundredth time. “Something we don’t know about. It can’t be this easy to advance into their last piece of territory.”

Hide sighed. _‘We’ve had dozens of recon missions to stake out the enemy. The last major infiltration gave me that flash drive a few months ago. There’s nothing we haven’t planned for, Kaneki.’_

“I know,” Kaneki said, stopping his back-and-forth pacing. He stared down at his palms so intensely, Hide thought he might bore holes in them. “I know we’ve prepared for every possible outcome. We have back-up plans for back-up plans. Probability-wise, we’re almost assured to win.” Hide sensed a “but” hidden in there somewhere, and he was right. “What if we’ve got a blind spot, Hide? Even if we’re ninety nine percent sure of victory, what if the enemy is operating on that 0.01%?” He wrung his hands. “There’s a chance they could come up from behind us with something we’ve never seen or imagined.” He looked up at Hide and the desperation in his eyes was something familiar yet alien at the same time. “What will we do then?”

Hide knew what Kaneki was imagining. He was thinking back to that night. He’d been confident in his choice, believed that it was the only one he could have made that would ensure the fate of his family and everyone that fought in the name of the world that he strove for. But that selfsame choice had spelled disaster upon everything he loved. Touka had been dead come morning.

He crossed the tent and stopped an arm’s length away from Kaneki, who now had his head in his hands. He stood there for god knew how long, trying to find a way to broach the gap between them. There were no words he could say, no words he could form with his hands, that would provide the one hundred per cent guarantee that Kaneki so craved.

“What will I do,” Kaneki said into his hands, “if I lose you?”

Hide’s stomach sank like a ball of lead. It hadn’t happened in so long, he’d almost forgotten what Kaneki was like when he was on the verge of giving up on everything. He’d been so focused on trying to balance on his own tightrope, that he’d barely spared a glance for Kaneki on his.

“You’re all I have left. You’re my only reason to keep going.”

He felt like crying. But the tears wouldn’t come. He was sorry for Kaneki, and he was sorry that things had come to this. Both of them were shattered vases clumsily glued back together. They wouldn’t hold out for long. Hide knelt and hesitantly put his arms around Kaneki. He felt stiff, like he was doing something that he wasn’t built to do. Kaneki raised his head and Hide felt his lips move against his ear.

“Without you, I wouldn’t care what happened to the rest of humanity,” he said softly. “But to save you, I have to save them too. If I hadn’t become this fucking fool playing at a king that I am now… maybe you and I would still be the same as we used to be.”

He was wrong. Hide knew it and he knew that Kaneki knew it. Nothing would have changed. They would still end up here, at this impasse where neither of them could make a move without gambling the fate of an entire world. Kaneki was lying to himself, blatantly and openly. He would still save mankind even if Hide died. 

He would play at a king for as long as it took. Because Hide would make sure of it. Because Hide, without hesitation, would chain Kaneki to the throne if it meant saving him.

* * *

That night, Hide had a dream. It was the day he’d met Touka as he was putting up missing posters for Kaneki. In the dream, it was raining—gentle rainfall, almost like a mist drifting down upon them—and everything looked frighteningly clear. He could smell the wet ground beneath his feet, the nylon-polyester mix of his windbreaker, the new detergent he was using, and the faint scent of coffee wafting toward him. He turned to see her standing there with the faintest traces of recognition in her eyes.

“Hide… right?”

His hands moved in front of him, spelling out his name in regular sign language. She squinted. Even when she did that, she was still somehow spellbindingly gorgeous. There was something unearthly about her. There had always been.

“Lucky catch,” Hide muttered before he could stop himself.

“What?” Touka asked. “What was that?”

“I… Wait. I can talk!” Hide’s hands flew to his throat. “I can…” No. Something wasn’t right. The world fractured a little, and suddenly Touka was saying something he couldn't make out properly. Slowly, her words started to come through, like little boats finding their way to shore from a sea of static.

“… could tell about him,” she was saying. Her face was downcast and her posture slouched. She didn’t meet his eyes once, until he started talking about Kaneki’s youth.

He wasn’t sure what he said. Something about Kaneki’s mother, some bullies, and the elementary school play. What he remembered in detail was the way she had listened with rapt attention. He knew instantly that she had wanted to protect him from that very moment. Hide wasn’t sure if she had already loved him then, or if she had fallen in love with Kaneki some time after Hide had told her stories of his childhood. Either way, when the rain stopped, they both looked up to see the sun breaking through the clouds. There were more Jacob’s ladders than he could count, rays of sunshine like spotlights upon the damp city. 

“It’s beautiful,” Touka said. 

Hide glanced back at her to agree, but his gaze stuck. She wasn’t her fresh, seventeen-year old self anymore. She was Touka, as most of Goat knew her, before she’d died. She was smiling at him. It was a soft, warm smile—without the edges that could kill. Hide felt his throat dry. Panic set in. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t speak. Blood was in his mouth, trickling, pooling…

“It’s a dream, you stupid idiot.” Touka’s voice was loud, jarring Hide back to the reality of his dream. She was scowling at him disapprovingly like he’d just screwed up something completely menial. But her expression softened. “You can talk here. It’s much easier when your voice isn’t involved.”

It felt as though a massive weight was lifted off of his body. He could breathe again.

“Thank you,” he said. He felt his throat move with the words. It was so strange to be able to speak again, if only in a dream.

Touka shook her head. “Don’t thank me. I’m just a figment of your imagination trying to remind you that none of this is real.”

“You’d come in handy with my nightmares,” he said, half-joking.

A dark look passed over Touka’s features—like a cloud passing by and eclipsing the sun for the briefest of moments. She smiled ruefully. “I can only help as much as you’ll allow me to.”

Hide opened his mouth to reply, and realized that he didn’t really want to know what she meant by that. It revealed far too much about himself that he cared to delve into right now. He sighed and leaned back in his chair. There were two cups of coffee on the table between them. Hide watched as Touka took one cup and drank from it, looking more serene than he’d ever seen her alive. Was this how his mind wanted to remember her?

“It’s hard without you around,” he found himself saying. “Kaneki and I have barely been holding on.”

“You’ve been able to lead an army to the enemy’s front door,” Touka replied coolly. “It isn’t a question of me being there.”

Bluntly put, but true. Hide even found himself close to nodding.

“But that’s not really what you want to ask me,” she said slowly, her eyes bright, “is it?”

Hide felt himself flush at the knowing look she was casting him. He had to remind himself that this was all a dream and of course Touka would know things about him that she normally wouldn’t. These were things he knew already, just not consciously. The eerie clarity of the dream however, was sowing doubt in him that he couldn’t erase.

“What was it like,” he said quietly before he could stop himself. The words were springing onto his lips without his volition. 

She cocked an eyebrow. “What was what like?”

“Oh, come on, you know what I’m talking about.”

“What? I’m a ghoul, not a mind reader.” Touka barely suppressed a smile as she feigned ignorance.

“You’re picking on me,” Hide whined. “Toukaaaa…” He pouted.

She laughed. “You have to say it out loud or I’m not going to ever know what you’re talking about.”

He groaned and covered his face with his hands. “I don’t want to. Saying it aloud makes it realer than I want it to be.”

“Then don’t,” Touka said, shrugging. “But you’ll have to think of something else for us to talk about. We have until you wake up and frankly, there are better things I could be doing.” She took another long sip from her cup as Hide shifted in his seat, debating with himself. Should he ask? Was it right to ask? But more importantly, did it matter? This Touka wasn’t exactly the original copy.

“Well?” she prompted.

Hide heaved a sigh. Here went nothing. “What was it like… being with Kaneki? Not as, like, a comrade or a friend.” He blushed. “I mean… As his lover. His wife.”

Touka grinned, her eyes sparkling with triumph. She’d made him say it. After all the time that he’d been wondering it silently, without wanting to put it into words, without wanting to give it power with his voice. He could tell that she wanted to bully him a little more for it, but he was grateful that she decided not to.

“I don’t really know,” she said truthfully. “I wasn’t at my happiest, I can tell you that. We were—are—in the middle of a war I wasn’t sure we would win. In some ways, I think I was desperate to make it last as long as I could, when I already knew that time was running out. I knew he was suffering… Maybe I did take advantage of that part of him… but I was desperate. I missed him. I wanted to make him happy again.” She smiled sadly. “The only way I knew how was to give my everything to him. I didn’t care about right or wrong. He always found purpose in protecting someone or something that he loved. I thought maybe, if I gave that to him, I could give him happiness or, at the very least, some solace from the living nightmare that was the world around us.” She paused and the poignant look on her face filled Hide with the urge to reach over and hug her. “But like I said, I’m just a figment of your imagination. I’m only saying things that you already know.”

She was right. He wasn’t surprised by her answer. He’d already surmised all of it a long time ago. But this was the first and only time that he was facing it, raw and unfiltered, with as much courage as he could muster. But there was more he needed to hear. 

“Do you regret it?” he asked. “Any of it?”

“No,” she said almost as soon as he asked. “None of it. I would do it all over again if I had the chance.” A pause. “And maybe, I’d try really hard not to die again.”

“Would I…?”

“Regret it?” She smiled. “That’s something you’d only know if you tried.”

“What if it goes wrong? What if I make a mistake? What if,” his voice faded to a whisper. “What if he doesn’t love me back?”

Touka threw her head back and laughed, long and loud. Even though Hide knew he was supposed to be annoyed, he was glad he could hear her laugh again. 

“Aren’t you the guy who came back from the dead?” she said, wiping the tears from her eyes. “I’m pretty damn sure you can get an idiot to fall in love with you.”

* * *

The ground shook with every explosion. Hide had been cut off from the rest of his unit after the surprise ambush. Far too many elite fighters had taken down half of his team and now he’d been separated from them. He let out a string of garbled curses under his breath as he ran for cover from the rain of gunfire.

He ducked into an alley, taking random turns, praying to the gods that he wouldn’t find himself at a dead end. They ignored him and a chain link fence appeared threateningly before him at the next turn. Beyond the fence was a wall extending up about five stories. Footsteps thundered behind him. He was running out of time.

He spotted a manhole on the ground at the foot of the fence. It would be terribly obvious, but at least it’d be somewhat easier to lose them underground. He lifted the cover, arms straining, and lowered himself down. He dragged the cover back into place before taking a deep breath of the putrid sewer air and descending into the blackness.

At the bottom, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a Maglite. He switched it on just as he heard more footsteps up above. Without waiting for them to make their way down to him, he picked a random direction and ran. 

_Kind of nostalgic_ , he thought idly as he navigated the twisting labyrinth of tunnels. He took care to remember every turn he made. It wouldn’t help to get hopelessly lost down here. Too many people were waiting for him on the surface. Too many people were waiting for him to come home.

He staggered and fell to his knees. Pain stabbed into him like wildfire. His hand was shaking as he pressed it to his side. When he saw the blood, he cursed again. No. _No_. Not here. Anywhere but here.

Hide forced himself to get on his feet. He had to run. He had to get back. If he didn’t… He shook his head vigorously, forcing the thoughts away. He couldn’t afford to think. It would only slow him down. With one hand on his side to staunch the bleeding and another holding the Maglite, he kept going. Farther and further down, with his pursuers hot on his trail. 

Darkness threatened to close in an all sides and the longer he ran, the more his head spun with visions of a past he didn’t want to remember. He didn’t care. Nightmares wouldn’t kill him—capture would. He slowed when the footsteps and voices began to fade. Then, panting, he collapsed in a heap. Black creeped in from the corners of his eyes as he curled into himself, clutching the Maglite tight. Blood kept gushing from his gunshot wounds. No matter how hard he tried, he no longer had the strength to get back up.

Tears flooded his cheeks. He wanted to scream in anguish—he’d failed. He was going to die. He didn’t want to die. There were so many things he had still to do. He’d promised himself he would change the world. 

_Why? What for? You don’t_ really _care about anyone else… do you?_

He really didn’t. For the longest time, he’d never given a damn about the rest of the world.There had always ever been just one person he would do anything for. Just one.

“Annerghi,” he said softly. Then again, louder. “Annerghi!” He slammed a fist on the ground and used it to push himself up. He would not be cowed here. He would _not_ die here.

“Annerghi,” he repeated. Over and over, with each bloody step forward, even as pain lanced through him.

The one person he would change the entire world for. The only one he would die to protect.

_Kaneki. Kaneki, Kaneki,_ Kaneki.

Hide’s vision faded and he fell, for a final time, with the name of the man he loved a dying breath upon his lips.

This time, he didn’t get up again.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> an exposition-heavy chapter and probably the shortest in this "series." i'll be back soon with chapter 7! thanks to all the people who've been leaving comments and kudos. you guys are what keep me going <3

Hide was drifting in nothing.

In this vastness of nothing, the first thing he did was wiggle his fingers. Then his toes. He sat up. There was nothing solid beneath him. In fact, he didn’t know if he was _really_ sitting upright. He could be upside down or sideways for all he knew. Yet he didn’t feel like he was drifting. There was no wind, no sense of gravity, nothing. Not even temperature. Was he breathing? He inhaled. Exhaled. It felt the same as always. Nothing made sense, but then again, he was dead. So he decided not to focus on the little things.

The most intriguing thing about nothing was its color. It wasn’t the blackest black or the whitest white. It wasn’t anything. Color was simply too two-dimensional—too _flat_ —to describe what this space of nothing had. Maybe the simplest way Hide could describe it to anyone was to tell them to imagine color except three- or even four-dimensional. Not exactly, say, a colored cube but color which _moved,_ was _alive_ , and existed throughout the past, the present, and the future. It made color sound like some sort of omnipresent God, but that was what Hide saw as he thought about dying.

He was sorry that he died. He was angry and disappointed in himself for dying. But most of all, he regretted leaving Kaneki to face the war alone. He could only imagine the fear and loneliness that would come crashing down on Kaneki when he found out that his “only reason to go on” had been snuffed out like a candle light. His stomach twisted with pure grief and he wept until his throat was raw and his face was drenched with tears.

He was sorry. He couldn’t be more sorry. He never wanted to leave Kaneki alone. He never wanted to let Kaneki fight a war all by himself. 

All Hide had wanted was to help him, to make the burden of living lighter. If only for a little bit. If only for a moment. But now he was dead, and he would stay here in this eternity of nothing with only his pain and regret to keep him company, living forever with the knowledge that Kaneki was up there, fighting alone, suffering alone, crying alone.

_Oh_ , he thought with a bitter smile. _So this is what Hell feels like._

* * *

But apparently hell wasn’t his final destination just yet. Hide gasped as he woke up and almost immediately he felt the scratchy dryness in his mouth and throat. He squinted in the dark, both trying to re-orient himself with the world and trying to make out anything that might hold water.

He was in what looked like a hospital room except it was stripped bare of equipment and furniture, save for the bed he was sitting on. There was an IV taped to his right hand. He resisted the urge to tear it off. The lights were out and a single window on the far end of the room was open, offering him a scant view of the night outside. There was a stiffness to his body and when he reached for his torso, he felt the bandages wound tightly around him. He couldn’t feel the wounds they were covering. Nothing hurt. Everything was clean, pristine, and painless.

He didn’t trust it. He was also desperately thirsty. Come to think of it, he was starving too.

Ignoring caution, he grit his teeth and ripped the IV from the back of his hand. It hurt and it would leave a bruise later, but the pain was nothing compared to everything he’d faced till now. He swung his feet off the bed and felt the cold linoleum floor underneath his toes as he shuffled out of the room. His legs wobbled every few steps and he had a bit of difficulty keeping himself upright, but he managed to make his slow way down the empty hallway. 

It was at that moment that he heard a voice cry out, “Hey!”

He turned to see a uniformed soldier jogging over to him. The symbol emblazoned on his shoulder indicated that he was on Hide’s side. The soldier’s pants were unzipped—he’d probably come from the toilet. 

“Scarecrow, sir,” the soldier said, saluting briefly before offering to help Hide walk. “I was advised to keep you in your room, at least until His Majesty comes back.”

Hide nodded and allowed himself to be led back to his room. He made eating and drinking gestures to tell the soldier what he needed.

“Food and water? Yes, sir. Right away, sir.” He helped Hide back to bed and patted the pockets of his uniform to find packets of rations. “I’ll be back with some water, sir. Stay right here.”

Hide nodded again and watched the young man leave. How old was he? 17? 18? How long had he been fighting? Had he been one of the kids that’d escaped with Touka in E14? If so, then war and suffering was all he’d ever known. He was also likely good at it, enough at least, to be entrusted with a solo station at Hide’s door. Or maybe they were _that_ short on troops.

_How long have I been here?_ Hide wondered. Days, weeks, _months_ might have gone by with him lying here in this hospital room. Just how much happened in that time? He chewed on the rations—a slice of chicken breast that was a little bit too dry for his taste.

It took the soldier around five minutes and when he returned, he came back with a Coleman jug of water and a doctor in tow—a portly man who fussed over Hide’s vitals and almost blew a fuse at the fact that he’d torn the IV drip from his hand. Hide drank greedily from the Coleman, washing down the rations and rejuvenating his energy stores. Suddenly he could think more clearly and with this, his mood improved drastically.

He waved to get the doctor’s attention away from the IV and made a scribbling motion. The man pulled out a thin pad of paper and a ballpoint pen that he handed over to Hide.

_How long was I out?_ was the first question he wrote down, at which the doctor narrowed his eyes at and adjusted his glasses to read.

“How long? I’d say about a week and a half,” he said. “You’re lucky you didn’t die instantly with half of your organs shredded like that. Must be that blood of yours.” He shook his head. “If you were completely human, I’d call it a miracle.”

_I’m around 80% human, if that helps._

The doctor huffed. “I’m not putting you back on the drip,” he said. “But here’s my unsolicited advice: try harder to live next time. I don’t think I need to tell you that you’re one of our main sources of morale.”

Hide smiled a little at that. There might have been a time when he well and truly was the class clown, the life of the party. But that was in the past. Now he tried harder to stay invisible, to let everyone else take up the limelight and to turn himself obscure so as not to attract any attention at all. A morale booster? He wasn’t that. Not really. Not anymore.

“Anyway,” the doctor said as he stood up to leave, “somebody wants to see you.” He gestured for the soldier to follow him out of the room and just like that, Hide was alone. He closed his eyes and thought he could feel the faintest breeze blowing in from the small open window. He remembered his dream, the one where he’d spoken to Touka. It was already half-faded in his memory, but he did his best to piece it together anyway. Her laughter, the coffee, the sun breaking through the clouds.

Redemption? Forgiveness? He didn’t know exactly what Touka had left him with, but he was sure of one thing and one thing only.

“Hide…?” 

He opened his eyes and grinned.

_Hey, ‘Neki_ , he signed. _I have something I wanna tell you._


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here it comessss

To say that Kaneki was relieved was an understatement. It looked as though he was falling apart by the second. He walked like a zombie fresh out of the grave, with stilted, unsure steps. Hide couldn’t blame him for looking like he did. This was, after all, the second time that Hide had come back from the dead. 

The phrase _Is this really happening?_ was written all over Kaneki's face. No, not that. It was _Do I deserve to have you given back to me again?_ When he took Hide's face in his hands, he was trembling violently and his tears were falling one after another like endless rainfall. Hide covered Kaneki's hands with his own. 

_I'm sorry,_ he wished he could say aloud. _I'm sorry I did this to you again._

Kaneki said nothing, only biting back sobs that inevitably squeezed their way out between his teeth in quiet whimpers as he pulled Hide into him. He buried his face into Hide's bare skin, just below his shoulder, and cried. Hide put his hand on Kaneki's head and felt his own tears prick at his eyes and slide down his own cheeks. 

Only years ago, they had done everything together. Teachers and parents would see them and smile and say they were like brothers, joined at the hip. Some kids at school would make fun of them, and when Kaneki tried to diffuse the rumors by distancing himself from Hide, Hide closed the gap in an instant with a laughing smile and a Walkman in one hand as he deftly put an earbud in one of Kaneki’s ears. 

A decade or so isn’t very long, and yet to Hide it felt like an eternity now spanned between them and the happy-go-lucky days of their childhood. Theirs were wounds that couldn’t be healed with a Fall Out Boy album or a couple re-runs of _The Silence of the Lambs_. Things simply got so complicated when you grew up. Jokes could no longer help them mend what little they had left. Pretending wouldn’t fix anything anymore.

“Hide,” Kaneki murmured as he pulled away, his voice thick with a million tears still unshed. “Thank god. Thank god…” He burst into a fresh bout of sobs and Hide held out his arms and let Kaneki collapse against him. Guilt bloomed in his chest, but he pushed it down. He was here now. If only for this moment, there wasn’t any room for anything else but the tender feelings in his heart. 

He took one of Kaneki’s palms and pressed a finger against it. He hadn’t tried doing this with anyone. He wasn’t even sure if it would get the message across. But he wanted to try, at least.

Kaneki lifted his head a little, still resting it against Hide’s chest, so he could see what Hide was tracing on his palm with such unusual care. In the darkness of the room, they had to rely more on sensation than sight and that in itself made the contact all the more intimate. When Hide finished tracing the words, Kaneki showed no reaction. He didn’t move an inch. That was okay. Hide hadn’t expected it to work the first time. He began to trace it again, even more slowly this time, taking extra time to make sure that the kana was clearly traced on Kaneki’s skin. They were both watching this happen, watching as the words spelled themselves out and feelings were exposed, raw and true.

“Stop,” Kaneki blurted, jolting them both out of the trance they were in. “Stop. Don’t.”

The impact of Kaneki’s words hit Hide a few seconds too late and he sat there, stunned, as Kaneki straightened, stretching the distance between them. 

“No,” he said quietly. “No, Hide. You can’t. Don’t do this.”

Hide didn’t know what to say, what to feel. In the first place, he should’ve known not to expect anything from this. Had he just assumed Kaneki would say yes from the start? He felt like an imbecile. Just because he’d had a self-induced delusion about Touka giving them her blessing didn’t mean that reality would bend in his favor.

‘ _I can’t?’_ He clenched his jaw to hold back the returning onslaught of tears. ‘ _Bear my heart out to you? Swallow my pride and be true to myself for once?’_ He wanted to stop himself, but the humiliation and the anger inside him were stockpiling faster than he could calm himself down. He didn’t feel like being rational, even though he knew that he was only going to make things worse. He breathed in. Then out. _‘I’m… not asking you for anything in return, Kaneki,’_ he signed. _‘I just had to let you know. To tell you. I didn’t…’_ He sighed. _‘I just wanted to tell you the truth after so many years of lying to myself, and to you. I…’_ He paused. Kaneki was shaking his head.

“No… I… I’m sorry,” Kaneki said. “I’m happy, Hide—I’m happy that you told me. But I can’t. We… can’t.” He chewed on his lip and seemed to be thinking hard about what to say, but whatever he would’ve said was lost when the soldier at the door poked his head in.

“Excuse me, Your Majesty,” he said, looking a bit hesitant to interrupt them. “The recon officers have arrived with field evaluation.”

Kaneki jumped to his feet, seemingly eager for a reason to leave the awkward tension. Hide caught him by the wrist.

“Hide?”

_Is it her?_ he wanted to ask. _Or is it me?_ But he couldn’t bring himself to ask. He’d sound not only pathetic, but like he resented Touka, and even Kaneki for loving her at all. He let Kaneki go.

“I’ll come back tomorrow,” Kaneki promised. “We can talk more. About everything.” Somehow Hide knew that what he meant by ‘everything’ was nothing at all. They would talk about the war effort, their progress, various strategies, just like they always had for the past few years. Hide waved goodbye and watched Kaneki leave, hoping he’d turn around and come back. He didn’t.

_Well_ , he thought, _that went well._ He lay back down and their conversation rewound in his mind. The more he went over the things he said, the more he was starting to feel like an idiot. He blushed furiously in the dark and hated himself for it. Hide had said some shitty things and yet… He was happy. Kaneki was _happy_ that he’d told him. Was that enough? For now, it was. Maybe in another life, he might have expected more. Maybe if he’d been born a woman, he might have had more right to own Kaneki’s heart. 

But Kaneki was happy. This was okay. Hide didn’t need anything else more than this.

* * *

The new makeshift base of operations was an operating room in the hospital. As with Hide’s room, most of the equipment had been removed, leaving only a mass of electrical outlets in the walls, looking like dreary little faces looking out on the exhausted men and women in the room. Everyone had greeted Hide warmly when he returned feeling almost good as new. Saiko had jumped into his arms, crying, then had proceeded to fuss over him and his bandages.

“You shouldn’t even be walking around yet!” she cried. “It’s only been a week!”

Hide started to tell her that he was feeling absolutely peachy and that she didn’t need to worry, but she didn’t seem to be listening. 

“Oh. You’re back.”

They turned and saw Urie striding across the room toward them. Most everyone thought he looked intimidating. They considered him difficult to talk to, and even harder to work with, but he did his job right. Hide knew that, even if he didn’t show it, Urie cared far more than he let others believe. He was, after all, one of the few people who didn’t stare too much when Hide first started leaving his mask by his pillow instead of wearing it all the time. He had also picked up sign language really quickly—far more quickly than a casual observer would.

_‘Is that all you’ve got to say, Kuki?’_ Hide signed, half-grinning, half-pouting (he couldn’t decide which to do first). _‘I just died and came back to life. Again. I think that merits a more enthusiastic response, don’t you think?’_

Urie seemed to struggle with his own facial expression, but he eventually settled on a sort of smirk. “Congratulations on your resurrection two-point-oh,” he said. “Shouldn’t you be in bed with a mimosa or something?”

Saiko bristled. “See?” she shot a pointed _I-told-you-so_ look at Hide. “Even _Urie_ thinks you should be resting.”

_‘Why rest when I can be here, living it up? I think I’ve been in hiding long enough.’_ Hide beamed as Urie and Saiko gaped at him and exchanged wide-eyed glances.

“You seem… different,” Urie remarked carefully. “Did a bullet hit you in the head or— _ow_ , Saiko!”

She’d smacked him in the arm and glared at him. She turned back to Hide. “What he _means_ is that you look good. No, great. Happier.” She cast him an affectionate look. “I haven’t seen your smile in ages. I’ve missed it.”

_‘Well my face muscles do need the rehab,’_ Hide signed thoughtfully. _‘Doc told me I was a source of morale too, so I figured I should step up my positivity.’_

Urie and Saiko exchanged looks again. They seemed to be capable of whole conversationswithout speaking a single word. It’d been happening more and more lately. Hide had to wonder if something had happened between them, but other than the surreptitious, meaningful glances, he couldn’t see if anything significant had changed in the way they talked to each other. He did, however, know about Saiko’s long-standing crush even if she hadn’t mentioned it in recent months.

_Good luck, Saiko,_ he thought. _Kuki’s a tough nut to crack, but maybe you’ve got him on the ropes after all._

The doors swung open and without preamble, Marude and Kaneki entered the room. Anything anyone had been saying dialed down into quiet murmurs and whispers. It wasn’t often that Kaneki and Marude were seen alone together (usually Hide was along with), and when they were, it usually meant a drastic change in plans.

“I want everyone to sit down,” Marude said, his voice resonating well in the former operating room. “What I’m about to say might disappoint you.”

The murmurs burst anew, but with a wave of his hand, Kaneki was able to silence them all. Hide hid a smile. Back in the day, Kaneki would’ve cowered in front of a room of people like this—and _this_ was a room of the most powerful humans, ghouls, and hybrids that they knew. Now he commanded every movement with a single look. Even if he didn’t want it, his was the aura of a king.

Once everyone was seated and had calmed down somewhat, Kaneki nodded to Marude. Hide leaned forward in interest as Marude cleared his throat.

“The enemy’s locked themselves up in their main headquarters,” he said. “We’ve weakened their strike force considerably, but at a steep price.”

There were no murmurs this time. Marude was talking about the very same mission that Hide had led a part of and which had been completely seen through by the enemy. They had succeeded in the end, but only just.

“Because of this, we’re at a stalemate, set for a weeks-long siege.”

Hide rubbed his chin. At this point, both sides were evenly matched. Hide and Kaneki’s army had the advantage being the one laying siege upon the enemy HQ, but it wasn’t that simple. On the surface it looked like it would be a game of patience. Whoever ran out of supplies first and surrendered was the loser. 

“We won’t last that long, even with the city’s supplies,” pointed out one of Marude’s men. “Their HQ has bunkers of the stuff underground.”

“Exactly,” Marude said gravely. “We don’t have the supplies nor the time for a long battle. Which means…” He looked at Kaneki.

“If we don’t make the decisive move now,” Kaneki said, “we’ll lose this battle _and_ the war.”

The room fell dead silent. No one wanted to think about defeat. They had come so far, after so many years, to this point. They’d taken the front from Japan, across continents, all the way to here. They simply couldn’t afford to lose. But that brought forth the question: _How can we win?_

“Something like this requires a gamble,” Kaneki said slowly. “A risk like nothing we’ve ever taken before.” He looked around at all the faces in the room, most of which wore expressions of grim resignation. They watched and waited for the plan with bated breath. “We’ll need an elite attack unit to penetrate their HQ, plant bombs in their supply bunkers, and effectively open up a path for the rest of the main force to come through. We’ll finish the war with a single, clean blow and strangle them from the inside.”

Silence. Nobody moved. 

“So in effect,” Akira Mado said, her arms folded across her chest, “you’re proposing a suicide bomber unit. Am I right?”

People began to mutter to each other. Doubt and uneasiness was starting to lace the atmosphere.

“Yes,” Kaneki said flatly. “That’s exactly what I’m proposing.”

The muttering grew louder. People began to protest. It was too dangerous, they said. Why would they take such a risk? They were already so short on capable troops. Who would they put on the unit? Disposables? No. It had to be full of elite, well-trained people. Then, who could they afford to lose?

Hide met Kaneki’s eyes and held his gaze. Then, slowly, he raised his notepad. 

_I volunteer to head the bomber unit._


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> reasons (read: excuses) for the late update:  
> 1) midterms  
> 2) chapter 143 essentially shelving this entire AU :'( kind of made me lose motivation for a few days but eh. fuck canon.
> 
> disclaimer: this ends on a HUGE cliffhanger (kind of?) so i apologize in advance

 

“No. Absolutely not.”

_‘Kaneki, you’re being overly emotional ab—‘_

“I said _no!_ ” Kaneki brought his hand down on the table, standing up on his feet and heading for the door. “We’ve argued enough about this. I’m not letting you get yourself killed, Hide. Good night.” He grabbed the handle and slammed the door behind him with brute force so violent that Hide thought the whole thing would fall from its hinges. He stared long and hard at it, and then at the chair behind the table where Kaneki had been sitting just moments before. A map of the city, marked and annotated, lay across the table, surrounded with handwritten reports and a multitude of coffee mugs, now empty, that must have been salvaged from the hospital kitchen. He sighed and started clearing the table.

Ever since his declaration the other day, Kaneki had refused to even talk to him without blowing up in his face and storming out the door like he just had. Hide tried, time and again, to talk to him as calmly as he could. But Kaneki just wasn’t listening to reason. Hide was the best person for this job and he knew it. He had the enemy headquarters’ layout practically engraved into his mind from all the intel that he’d received from his network of spies and contacts. He was stealthy, quick on his feet, and he knew exactly how to get in and around without being seen. He had years of experience doing this, years that no one else could match. Why was Kaneki being so difficult about this? The choice was clear.

“Rebuffed again, huh?”

Marude stood, leaning against the doorframe, his eyes cradled by shadows shaped like little quarter-moons. He moved to help Hide gather up the reports and stack them up on the table as orderly as they could manage. They were silent as they moved in perfect unison, and in minutes they had the temporary war room all neat and organized. In fact, it was almost completely unrecognizable from what it looked like a few minutes ago. Only the map of the city, undisturbed, lay exactly where it was.

“You wanna take a walk? It’s still early enough to talk a little,” Marude said. His eyes were unreadable but Hide thought he could see the sliver of concern that Marude tried to conceal.

They walked down the length of a corridor that ran along one side of the hospital. At least half of the windows were shattered and shards of of glass littered the floor. The moon was full and bright, casting long shafts of dull light in between shadows cast by the windows and looking like a series of jail cell bars. They walked briskly. Nobody could tell for sure when a sniper would pop up and by the time they did, someone would be dead. Open windows on the eve of a full moon were simply begging for a skilled headshot.

If he could, Hide would have made a joke or any attempt at all to break the silence between them as they walked. But as much as he wanted to, he knew it was something he could no longer do without the help of pen and paper or his limited sign language vocabulary. He could only hope that Marude was feeling talkative since he’d been the one to extend the invitation. 

“I can understand his line of thinking,” Marude said once they’d reached a corridor with a good lack of windows. “Anyone who volunteered willingly to be on that unit would have to be perfectly insane.”

Hide pursed his lips as he pulled out his notepad and started scribbling. _‘You already know how good I am at making the worst possible decisions.’_

“I do, unfortunately,” Marude sighed. “I’ve known you for years, Nagachika, and yet some days, it feels like I’m talking to a stranger.” He eyed Hide for a long while, as though searching for an answer that he knew he wouldn’t be able to find. “If you know how stupid it is to jump in front of the barrel of a gun, why would you do it?”

_‘Because there’s nothing else I’d rather do.’_

Marude scoffed. “I never thought you’d be the type to martyr yourself at the drop of a hat.” He stopped at a certain door and gestured with one hand for Hide to follow him in. They entered and Marude closed the door behind them.At first it was too dark to make anything out, but with an almost dismissive flick of his wrist, Marude switched on the portable electric lamp sitting near the edge of a table. Hide noted with no small degree of surprise that they were in his private quarters.

“Go ahead and pull a chair,” Marude said. 

Hide obeyed and took his seat on one of three chairs scattered about the center of the room. From this vantage point, he looked around. The place was as messy as he’d imagined. A copy of the map on the war room table was pinned to the wall. Surrounding it were hand-drawn sketches of the enemy headquarters’ layout with several annotations written on the margins in red marker. There were were used paper cups everywhere—on the floor, on the bed, on any conceivable surface, either stacked or on their lonesome—and the stench of brewed coffee hung heavy in the air. No wonder Marude hadn’t been getting enough sleep. He was running on at least five liters of caffeine.

“Here.” Marude had pulled a chair up next to him and was proffering him a paper cup not unlike the ones that littered the room. Hide nodded in thanks and accepted it, only to frown when he smelled something that wasn’t quite coffee. Marude smiled and raised his own cup. “Found a bit of a pick-me-up under a doctor’s desk in block B. Shouldn’t hurt to have a little bit, especially since this’ll all be over come Wednesday.” He shot Hide a conspiratorial wink. 

Hide laughed and raised his cup of wine to the toast, then brought it to his lips. The wine tasted like sour mulberries flavored with just a hint of honey. There was a bit of an oaky undertone to it, but it had really aged well. Hide couldn’t recall the last sip of wine he’d had but he knew that he’d definitely tasted much worse than this. He was grateful for it.

Marude polished off his wine in a single gulp and sighed in contentment. He considered the cup in his hand for a little while, deep in thought, tapping one finger against the rim. “You know, Nagachika, I knew you were something else from the moment you first opened your mouth in my office.”

_Oh, not this story again_ , Hide thought, rolling his eyes amusedly. 

“You probably thought you had me fooled. Or maybe you knew you hadn’t. But all in all, I already had you pegged as shady. Dropping a tracker on Jason? Stealing a dead ghoul’s clothes? You sounded like a madman. You put up this calm and cool facade, just a tiny bit nervous for effect, but I knew.” Marude shook his head. “I just knew you were full of shit.”

_‘So why hire me? If you knew I was a diabolical bastard, why get me on the team?’_

He breathed a laugh. “You already know. Keep your enemies closer and all that,” he said. “I’m sure you’re tired of hearing this shit over and over, but there’s a reason why I keep bringing it up these days.”

There was a weariness to Marude, suddenly, that Hide realized he hadn’t noticed before. The lines on his face had grown deeper, resembling cuts gouged in by time and grief and fury. 

“See, Nagachika, you’re a good kid,” he said, choosing his words with care. “When you put your mind to something, there’s nothing you can’t do. Ingenious, efficient, and loyal to a fault. All with a decent sense of humor and a vision for peace. What I’m saying is, a guy like you only comes around once every century. Someone whose good intentions outweigh their ego.”

Hide smiled. What he knew, what Marude didn’t know, was that he was no hero. He was just a guy with a problem with obsession. Just a guy who took things too far. _‘You’re underestimating the size of my ego then.’_

“I’m not calling you a saint,” Marude said pointedly.

_‘Then what are you calling me?’_

The look he shot Hide was steely yet sympathetic. An odd sort of look that was unique to Marude. Tough love, almost like a parent’s, but he was undoubtedly resisting it. 

“You’re a fool in love. Always were, always have been. And if you do go on that suicide mission, you always will be.” He grimaced, like saying the words had taken all of his effort and he hated the taste of them in his mouth. Hide couldn’t blame him for feeling that way. He was embarrassed as it was just hearing them.

_‘I never—‘_

“I didn’t need you to spell it out for me, Nagachika,” Marude sighed. “I’ve always known. This is just the first time I ever brought it up because it looks like it’s not exactly a secret anymore. You’re a wreck. _Both_ of you are.”

_‘Actually,’_ Hide signed, _‘Kaneki looks completely fine to me.’_

Marude gave him a flat stare, then shrugged and said, “Whatever you say. I’ll just get to the point I was trying to make then.”

Hide nodded. He had a feeling Marude still thought of him as the same upstart private investigator who’d practically shown up at his doorstep with a plethora of evidence against Aogiri. Even now, nine years later, with an army behind him and a thousand scars, he was still that same upstart to Marude. He was like a problem child in constant need of supervision, bound to trip over himself and scrape both knees if no one was there to catch him by the scruff of his neck.

“As much as I trust you, Hide,” Marude said, giving his nickname unprecedented weight, “the one thing I would never let you place bets on is your own life. That’s a wager you almost lost once and I doubt you can get away from this without losing more than just your voice.” Marude’s jaw set and in the dim light of the electric lamp, Hide thought he had never seen him look so grave. “But I know what I am, and what I’m not. I’m not your dad. I’m not here to stop you from doing what I think you shouldn’t do. All I’m here for is to give out orders and offer advice. And this is the best I can do.” His gaze bore into Hide, flinty and unwavering. “Don’t be an idiot. You’ll die.” 

_‘I’m sorry. I have to.’_ In much the same way as Marude was unflinching in his attempt at persuading him to stay, he was staunch in his conviction that he absolutely had to go. It wasn’t because he _wanted_ to die. He already knew it would be a death sentence. That wasn’t the point of going. He simply knew that he was the best man for the job. He was the logical choice. Everyone was just being too emotional.

Marude took one more long look at him before sighing heavily and getting on his feet. He headed over to where he had tucked the wine bottle out of sight behind a shelf and poured himself another cup.

_‘Careful,’_ Hide signed warningly. _‘If we get ambushed now, we’re going to need you sober.’_

“I know my own limits, Nagachika,” Marude replied shortly, downing the cup in one gulp once again. He closed his eyes and sighed again. “Well, now that that’s out of the way,” he said, “we can start talking about how you can get in and out of there alive and in one piece.”

Hide’s eyes widened. _‘You’re gonna help me?’_

“Of course I’m going to help you,” Marude said, smirking. “No protégé of mine has the privilege of dying without living to see this world become a better place.”

* * *

Hide would wonder where they went wrong. He would ask himself if they were just unlucky, or if they had been born to play out a tragedy from the very beginning. Did they make one wrong choice, or a hundred? A thousand or a million? At what point did it become less a matter of chance and more a matter of inevitability? He remembered, just once, hearing Kaneki mutter in his sleep. _It wasn’t supposed to be like this._

As he went through his scant belongings—his mask, notepad, pen, an old watch—he realized that he couldn’t agree more. It really wasn’t supposed to be like this. It should’ve ended a long time ago. Maybe if they’d had a little bit more courage and a little bit more foresight, they might have been able to trump Furuta from the very start. Maybe if he hadn’t been so afraid of seeing Kaneki again, they wouldn’t be here like this, toeing lines between them that they could no longer cross.

_Wonder if I need to write a will again,_ Hide thought absently. He probably didn’t—he barely had anything left to his name—but it was better to have one than to have none. So he sat down and put pen to paper. Writing the first part—the formalities—was easy, but the next few parts had him hesitating. Through the haze of words coming and going in his mind, he heard faint knocking sounds.

He paused. Someone knocked again. He checked the battered watch on the table. It was around 3:30 AM. Witching hour. It was early enough to be urgent but late enough to be the opposite.

After a couple more knocks, Hide got up and opened the door.

“Oh,” he said unthinkingly.

“Hey,” Kaneki said with an uneasy smile. “Can I come in?”

He felt a little like he’d lost direction. He let Kaneki in and tried to make sense of why he felt so off-kilter. When the door closed behind him and reality caught up to the present, he was jolted out of his meditative reverie. It didn’t help that Kaneki looked uncomfortable. This was likely going to end up a lengthy and loaded argument. Hide sighed.

_‘Is there anything you need?’_ he signed. _‘I’m a bit busy.’_

“No, I—“ Kaneki hesitated. “I just want to talk.”

_‘If this is about the bomber unit, you already know what I’m g—’_

“I’m letting you go,” he blurted.

Hide blinked. _‘What?’_

Kaneki grimaced and said, “I’m letting you go on the mission. I thought about it, and I know I’ve made mistakes—the worst mistakes—by letting my heart rule my head. I’m a leader—a king, even—and yet I haven’t even gotten the basics down.” He looked Hide in the eye. “I want to trust you. I want to believe in you.”

_‘So you’re letting me go…?’_ Something about that didn’t sit well with him. He was relieved, yes, but at the same time… Maybe, in some way, he hadn’t wanted Kaneki to let him go.

“I am,” Kaneki said firmly. “But only because I believe you can come back to me.”

_‘To you? What makes you say I’d come back to you?’_

He went wide-eyed with innocent confusion. “Who else would you go back to?”

_‘You’re not the only friend I have in the world, Kaneki.’_

“Yeah, but I’m the only one you’re in love with, right?” Kaneki retorted.

Hide flushed. _‘Get out. I’m grateful you came all this way to tell me your decision, but that’s all I needed to hear.’_

“No, no, wait, stop, I’m sorry,” Kaneki said in a panic, catching Hide by his wrists. “I’m not… making fun of you. I want—no, I need to—ugh. I can’t say this right.” He cursed under his breath. Hide could see Kaneki’s ears turning pink and felt his own heart jump to his throat. “I was afraid—I wasn’t prepared to lose you again. I’m still not. I never will be. But I can’t just shackle you to myself, no matter how much I care about you. I want to trust you. I _know_ I can trust you. Hide, I—“

_‘Stop,’_ Hide signed. His face felt so hot, he didn’t want to look at Kaneki. He’d forgotten how to breathe. He had to think of each breath. Inhale, exhale. Timed to the quick beat of his heart. _‘Stop. I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but if you’re trying to sweet-talk me into forgetting about the mission—‘_

“I’m not,” Kaneki protested. “I want to be honest with you, just like you were with me. It wasn’t fair, what I did. I want to make it up to you.”

They were so close. Just centimeters apart. Close enough to taste each other’s breath. Hide wanted to close his eyes. Like this, he was almost certain the nightmarish visions would come back to him. He hadn’t seen them in weeks and the medics had told him he was on the road to recovery, but like this… He felt like he was walking the sharp edge of a knife. He felt like he was deliberately taunting death.

He loved it.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wasn't sure if i should raise the rating on this one, but if you aren't into the steamy stuff, just do the ctrl (or command) + F to the line 'Hide smiled, felt his lip quiver, and almost let himself go again.'
> 
> one more chapter to go! thanks for all the support until now <3

“Hide,” Kaneki breathed, and then they were kissing. Slow, sweet, and lingering, it was the stuff of starry-eyed teenage first loves. It was coffee on early weekday mornings. It was the late afternoon bike ride from school to see him. It was the American rock they listened to in high school. It was the twentieth re-run of _The Silence of the Lambs_ , when once Kaneki fell asleep, Hide had to tuck him in and resist the urge to hold his hand. 

When Kaneki pulled away, his cheeks were flush with color. His hands dropped from Hide’s wrists and their fingers intertwined together. Hide struggled again to remember how to breathe. How had he ever done it without thinking?

_No_ , he wanted to say, but without his voice, he couldn’t lie to himself. To have Kaneki’s dry lips on his scarred ones, to have their breaths intermingling, and to have each other in a moment so intimate and tender that it was almost sacrilegious to ruin it all. This was everything he had ever wanted. This was everything he never thought he could have.

It had to be a delusion, a trick of the mind. Nothing could be as easy as the way Kaneki held him steady as they kissed. Everything up until now had been an uphill battle and a struggle to survive to see tomorrow with the desperate hope that nothing would go so irreparably wrong. What was life like when it wasn’t shitty? What was it like when Hide _didn’t_ have to write down the pros and cons of living it at all? He didn’t remember. He _couldn’t_ remember. All he knew was that Kaneki was kissing him with a passion unforetold by anything they had ever said and done to each other.

He was good at it too. Disappointingly good. There was a decided flow to the way he moved his lips. He knew how to tilt his head at an angle that didn’t let their teeth knock into each other. He knew how to take his sweet time. He knew how to make it sensual without even trying at all. His skill made some part of Hide’s heart itch with jealousy, knowing that he would never take Kaneki’s first and that that was a special place reserved only for Touka. But even then, despite the nagging suspicion that he was only a distraction and possibly even just a cheap replacement, he felt like he couldn’t care any less.

Kaneki made a tiny, pleasantly surprised noise when Hide finally matched his fervor. At first he let Kaneki guide him through the motions, the ins and outs of it. He’d never realized how complicated it was. Even as he was struggling to keep up, he still couldn’t understand how deeply and how easily Kaneki had rooted himself in his heart. 

The kiss was getting hotter by the second, deeper and slower by the minute. Kaneki’s hands were on either side of his face, holding him firm but with a delicacy that said he was something too precious to break with clumsy fingers. He didn’t know what to do with his own hands. He kept them stiff at his side, not knowing what to do with them. 

“Hide,” Kaneki murmured in between kisses. “Hide…”

Hide wanted to open his eyes, even a fraction, but he was scared he’d open them to a dream. Even when the backs of his legs felt the edge of his bed, even when he was falling backward into the sheets, he kept his eyes closed. He felt Kaneki get on the bed, felt the weight shift and felt Kaneki’s legs brush against his. Kaneki’s fingers, rough and callused, touched his cheek, tracing a line that ended just below his ear.

“Hide, I love you.” Kaneki’s voice was soft and sweet, but his words danced around in Hide’s mind, echoing over and over until he doubted if any of this was even real. “I love you.” He breathed a laugh. “I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember. And I can’t believe I’ve only just realized it. I love you. God. Was it this easy to say it? Why am I only saying this now?”

Hide released a breath he’d been holding in for god knows how long and dared to open his eyes. _‘That’s what I should be asking.’_ He laughed too, albeit hesitantly. 

“I’m sorry,” Kaneki said quietly. “I’ve been such a dick all week. No, not just this week. Ever since—Ever since we met, I’ve been using you. When I wasn’t sure of things, I’d turn to you. When you were gone, I didn’t have anyone I could run to.”

_‘You had Arima. Akira. The Quinx.’_ Hide propped himself up on his elbows. _‘You were never truly alone, Kaneki. You know that.’_

“I do know. But just because I wasn’t alone doesn’t mean I wasn’t lonely. Nothing anyone did or said could fill in the void you left behind.” Kaneki sat on his heels, his hands palms-up on his lap. “I was happy, but I could have been happier.”

_‘Now you just sound like a spoiled brat.’_

Kaneki smiled sadly. “I probably am one. I’ve just been spoonfed from the beginning. Years ago, I was just a baby on the throne. I thought I knew everything. Thought I could save everything. I thought I could be the hero. I thought I could be to Touka what you had always been to me.”

Hide felt his heart sink a little at the mention of her name, but he ignored it and reached out to put his hand on Kaneki’s. 

“I love you, Hide,” Kaneki said, almost pleadingly. “I am who I am because of you. I—”

Hide had cut him off swiftly with the one thing he now knew how to do—he’d sat up and kissed him. Though at first surprised, Kaneki quickly got into it, kissing back with the same ardor as before. Hide put one hand against Kaneki’s face, touching his cheek gently, absently running his fingers across it as they kissed. 

Then he was on his back again, Kaneki hovering just above him. In the back of his mind, Hide saw the faintest afterimage of a crazed ghoul with a wide-open maw dripping with saliva and blood. But somehow, things were different now. He didn't feel like vomiting. There were no screams clawing at his throat. He saw Kaneki, watched him slowly tug off his shirt, and when he reached and touched his tough abdomen, he laughed a little to himself.

Kaneki blushed. “It’s not as attractive as you expected, huh,” he said, a feeble attempt at a joke.

_‘Oh no, I wasn’t expecting_ anything _like this.’_ Hide laughed again and Kaneki cracked a nervous smile. Hide watched him again in wonder. How had he not run away from this? Nightmares from years ago would always threaten him into sleepless nights and torturous memories. But in recent months, those memories had become faded around the edges and now, suddenly, in a moment of clarity, only _this_ Kaneki remained.

_‘Can I touch you?’_ Hide signed without thinking.

“You already are,” Kaneki said, chuckling. 

_‘Oh. Right.’_ Hide’s palm was on Kaneki’s stomach. It was rough, scarred everywhere and hardened by years of fighting a war that would end in only a matter of days. _‘I miss your baby fat.’_

“Really?” Kaneki said. He was grinning as he leaned forward, pressing his lips against Hide’s neck. “If you could have any of my old self back, would my baby fat be at the top of that list?”

_‘Maybe,’_ Hide signed, though Kaneki was too busy to see his hands move. By now, he was already feeling too lightheaded to think. Kaneki’s hot breath against his neck was all he knew and he was scrambling to think of a way to respond. He felt a moan at the base of his throat. He swallowed it, and felt his face grow hot.

“Can I touch you now?” Kaneki asked, his half-lidded gaze turning Hide’s thoughts to mush. Hide nodded in reply and he almost instantly regretted it when he felt Kaneki’s hands on his abdomen, inching upward under his shirt. He bit the inside of his cheek, breathing hard against the sounds that he knew would get him into trouble.

Kaneki lifted Hide’s shirt by the hem, pushing it up till it bunched up at his armpits. He ran his fingers down Hide’s skin, from his sternum to his navel, tracing an intimate line. He seemed to be hesitating, even now. Hide pursed his lips.

_‘Go ahead,’_ he signed. _‘I’m not some work of art. You can touch me as much as you want to.’_

“I—” Kaneki looked at him. “I want to. I really want to.”

_‘Then touch me.’_

Permission had turned into direct order. Kaneki smiled a little, then let his hands wander places Hide had never imagined they’d go. He breathed hard again, exhaling sharply when Kaneki’s fingers flicked against one of his nipples. Aborted moans were all he could bear to let himself manage. He was already embarrassed out of his mind. He couldn’t let himself turn into a mess just yet.

Kaneki’s hands were on his hips. Hide could feel himself throbbing with heat. If he weren’t still so embarrassed, he would’ve kicked his pants off then and there. But instead he unwittingly let out a cracking whimper when Kaneki’s hand brushed against his burgeoning erection.

_‘If you want to do it, then do it, just take them off,’_ Hide signed a bit frantically. 

“Are you sure?” Kaneki looked doe-eyed with innocence, yet Hide could see he was trying not to smile.

Hide rolled his eyes and unbuttoned, unzipped his pants. He shimmied out of them and pulled one foot out first to kick them off the other. Kaneki mirrored his movements and then they were both in their underwear, drinking in the sight of each other. Hide wanted to kiss him. He ached to. So he did. He pulled Kaneki into him and felt the warmth of his body all along his own. Through thin cloth, their erections rubbed against each other with tantalizing friction.

The kisses were hot and breathless and left Hide’s head spinning. This was nothing like any passing fantasy he had ever had and because it wasn’t, he found himself trying to memorize every single detail, from the pulse in Kaneki’s neck, to the planes of his bare chest and the light downy hairs leading down from his navel. He wanted to not only remember everything but to burn it all into his memory, sear it into his flesh.

“Hide, I want to—”

_Do it_ , Hide wanted to say, but he was only waving his hands a little, making no sense at all.

Kaneki hooked a finger around the hem of his underwear and tugged it downward until it reached mid-thigh. Hide sucked in a breath as the chill night air reached him, and he had nowhere to hide. Why was he doing this again? Why was he here? He couldn’t recall. He only knew now the sensation of Kaneki’s hand on his cock, thumbing the tip, then pumping up and down and back again.

He felt his back arch without him telling it to. He was losing it, his sense of reality. He screwed his eyes shut and breathed hard again. Inhale, exhale, as Kaneki clumsily tried to make him come. Hide liked that though. He liked that Kaneki was unsure. It meant he was in virgin territory for once. Kaneki leaned over him until he could feel their shallow breaths mingle. 

“Hide.” It was his name but in a mangled exhale of breath as their cocks touched, bare skin against bare skin without anything in between. “Hide.”

_Ken._ Hide wished he could say it. This was the first time he’d ever wished he could speak again, if only to say his name too. _Ken, I love you,_ he would’ve said. So many things he would’ve said, if only he could speak.

_I don’t want to die. I want to stay here, with you. I want to leave all this shit behind with you._

All the selfish things, all the confessions, the truths, the filthy truths, all of them were banging on the walls, trying to tear down the silence between them. Hide’s breath hitched in his throat and he swallowed a sob. His hand flew to his mouth as soon as Kaneki looked up at him, breathless and red in the face.

“Hide, are you okay?”

_‘I’m fine. I’m fine. Keep going.’_

“Hide, if you’re not comf—”

_‘Just keep going!’_

Kaneki stopped moving and crawled a little ways up, resting his forehead against Hide’s. “I’m not going to move until you say you’re okay without lying to me.”

_‘You’re covered in sweat.’_

“You are too.”

_‘Gross.’_

“Well, at least we’re gross together?”

_‘Don’t make it worse.’_

Hide smiled, felt his lip quiver, and almost let himself go again. He put one hand against the back of Kaneki’s neck. He was still terrified of losing this. He was only just beginning to feel like the pros of living were outweighing the cons. 

He wasn’t sure, at the end of it, what regrets he had, if he had any at all. If someone asked him if he thought it was the right thing to do, he wouldn’t have been able to think of an answer right away. It wasn’t as though sex was the solution to every problem in the world. Neither was it an escape. It was just something they needed. When they couldn’t find answers in words, they found it in the heat of each other’s embrace.

That was the feeling Hide remembered when the bomb went off. He remembered Kaneki’s arms around him. He remembered how hard it was to breathe and how easy it was to lose his mind. He remembered Kaneki’s smile, and how it lit up his entire world from, almost literally, the cradle to the grave.

He thought he could reach into his pocket and pull out that pros and cons list and strike everything out. It didn’t matter anymore, anyway.

It might have been too romantic to think that he was born to meet Ken Kaneki, to fall hopelessly in love with him, to watch him grow from awkward, indecisive boy-king to a true leader, like he was always meant to become. Hide felt a little emotional in his last moments, like shedding a tear if he had the time. 

He was just glad. Relieved. Happy, that he’d spent his entire life loving a fool who didn’t know what he was doing half the time. 

And maybe it was petty of him to think this, but he was on cloud nine now, knowing that that fool loved him back in the end too.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey it's the last chapter! ..............or is it? :)))))
> 
> thank you so so much for all the support until now. thank you for all the kudos, thank you for all the comments. you all have no idea how much all of it motivates me. i've had so much fun writing this AU, and i think i've had my fill of angst for quite some time.
> 
> i just want to make a brief s/o to these awesome, beautiful people who came back to read this again and again, no matter how much i pummeled them with angst:  
>   
> ♡Ovmadns  
> ♡Verathin  
> ♡Plumptie  
> ♡AuroraNight  
> ♡Attack_on_Gravity  
> ♡eudoraz  
> ♡MediocreWriter
> 
> special mention: ayainu and hidewari!! talented, amazing people i am proud to call my friends who've read this and honestly? it makes me so happy that they did and that they liked this <3
> 
> you guys are the best, i love all of you, and i want to shower you all with love... in the form of angst, most likely. :') i always look forward to hearing from you guys about the latest chapter, and i'm never disappointed. thank you thank you thank you!
> 
>  
> 
> listen to [this](https://open.spotify.com/track/7aLtOxVOUahFU8fO25hWoH) after reading everything and imagine the credits roll, because if this were a movie and if i were the director, that's how i'd end it :D

A car rolled into the parking lot, its wheels crunching gravel as it chose a spot and backed in slowly. It was a rental—a well-kept wine red sedan. A four-seater. Only two people were in it today, though. The driver shut the engine off and the passenger door opened. A young boy, around ten or eleven years old, hopped out, a smartphone in his hands. He seemed completely absorbed in it, tapping and sliding his fingers across its surface with his brows furrowed in concentration.

After a few minutes, he noticed that the driver hadn’t gotten out with him. He raised his head from the phone and looked back. “Dad?” he called. “Dad, come on.”

“Yeah,” Kaneki said from the driver’s seat, holding a modest bouquet in his hands. It’d been a year since the funeral. Still he wasn’t sure if he was ready to face reality. He took a deep breath anyway, as if taking in that gulp of air would keep himself from drowning. “Yeah, I’m coming.”

He stepped out of the car and closed the door behind him. It locked with a two-tone beep and he started walking out on the green expanse with his son, who was now, yet again, immersed in his smartphone game.

“Hide,” Kaneki said in his best imitation of a responsible adult. “You’re not supposed to play games in the cemetery. I told you that yesterday.”

Hide groaned and pocketed his phone. “Okay, fine. Now what do I do?”

“Uh, make conversation? Interact with me?” Kaneki sighed. “It shouldn’t be that hard to talk to your own father, you know.”

“I talk to you every day, Dad.”

“Yeah and I’m sure you can spare another one,” Kaneki said flatly.

They crested a low hill to see a sea of unmarked graves—little headstones with no names, only dates—surrounding a single massive monument, a tower of granite with a plaque inscribed with names. He felt a lump in his throat seeing it. On that plaque was every man and woman that had died fighting for him and with him, for a peaceful world that they would never see themselves. Knowing that he had their blood on his hands made the experience of walking toward the monument all the more somber.

“Is everyone in there?”

Kaneki glanced down at Hide. “Hm?”

“Is everyone in there,” he repeated. “I know Mom is back home, but…”

“Yeah. Everyone’s here.” Kaneki paused. “That is… Everyone they could find…all in one piece.”

“Oh.” Hide tried to hide it but Kaneki felt him shudder. A natural reaction. No one who hadn’t seen the atrocities of all-out war could possibly stomach the idea of finding someone you used to talk to, share meals with, and sparred with, reduced to pieces the next day. It was, for lack of a better term, traumatizing.

Upon reaching the monument, Kaneki had to crane his neck to see the full size of it. The country’s government had truly gone above and beyond expectations to fund this. It was at least twice the size of the memorial in Tokyo. It seemed only fitting, as most of the bloodiest battles had been fought here, not there.

Kaneki traced the names with his fingertips. Touka, Irimi, Yoshimura, Hinami’s mother, Akira’s father… Everyone who had lost their lives not only to the final war but to the human-ghoul conflict that had gone on for decades. He took another deep breath and gently laid the bouquet at the foot of the memorial. Then he stepped back to offer a solemn silence. 

As he was trying to recall happy memories with Touka and the rest of Anteiku, he felt raindrops pelt his cheeks. He looked up, squinting, at the gray sky above him and Hide. Then, out of nowhere, a shadow passed over him and the sky was now pitch black. An umbrella.

“Hey, Hide?” He fished out his car keys and handed them to his son. “You wanna wait in the car a sec? I’ll be right with you.”

“Can I play games in the car?”

“I—Yes, fine.”

“Sweet.” He snatched up the keys and darted away, kicking up grass as he went.

_‘I’m still honored you chose to name your own kid after me, the biggest pain in your ass since kindergarten.’_

“Are you sure you aren’t talking about me?” Kaneki asked as he stepped closer to Hide under his umbrella, close enough to smell the sweat and grime on him. He leaned his head against Hide’s shoulder as they watched his son traipse up the hill. 

_‘I can’t promise you I’m not projecting.’_

They watched until long after the little boy disappeared over the hill. After that, Kaneki wasn’t sure what he was looking at or if he wanted to look at anything. His gaze fell over everything, from the distant greens to the gravestones wet with the morning rain. Nothing felt right. Then again, nothing had ever felt right since that night.

“It sucks.”

_‘What does?’_

“That I couldn’t save you.”

_‘Well it wasn’t your fault. We both knew what would happen. I chose it too, in the end.’_

“We knew it would and yet I still let you.” 

_‘If you still blame yourself for—’_

Kaneki straightened, tears stinging his eyes. “Every day I wonder what would’ve happened if I hadn’t let you go. If I’d been a selfish asshole and forced you down. I wonder if any choice I made was the right one, because I’m standing here, alone.”

_‘You’re not alone, Ken,’_ Hide signed. _‘I told you that. You’re never alone. From the very beginning, until the end, until now, until forever. I’m always here, with you.’_

“Don’t start with some—sentimental crap about you being in my heart for all eternity because _that’s not going to bring you back!_ ” Kaneki’s voice had been rising before he knew it, and now he was shouting in the middle of an empty cemetery to no one. “No matter what you say, no matter what—overly emotional, sugarcoated shit you tell me, nothing changes the fact that I’m standing here, hallucinating you, yelling at you and—and—God— _fuck_ —” Tears ran down his cheeks and he rubbed at his eyes with the backs of his thumbs.

Hide simply stood there and watched him wordlessly. The silence was almost deafening and it only made him miserable.

Every time he came here, he would be driven to tears by his own mind conjuring up a vision of Hide, torturing him with what-if’s and could-have-been’s. Hide was his biggest what-if. His worst could-have-been. In a way he hated Hide for leaving, even after the night they had shared everything with each other. A naive part of him must have thought that he could give Hide a reason not to go.

“I know already,” he said, his voice thick with tears. “I know it wasn’t like that. We—I did that because I wanted to.”

_‘I’d be devastated if you had sex with me against your will.’_

Kaneki’s head snapped up. “That’s not funny, Hide.”

Hide shrugged. _‘I’m only saying what you’re thinking.’_

With an exasperated half-groan, half-sigh, Kaneki dropped his head into his palms and sank to a squat. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I didn’t mean… to make you say that.”

_“I know,”_ Hide said. He lowered himself to the ground, patting the grass before sitting down Indian style. He put a hand on Kaneki’s head, slowly ruffling his hair. _“Look, Ken, you’ve done things wrong and you’ve done things right. Nobody—_ Nobody _—could have asked you for more than you’ve already given. You’re only human, Ken. People make mistakes.”_

Kaneki scoffed. “I stopped being human a long time ago. Same rules don’t apply.”

_“You gotta stop drawing the line, ‘Neki,”_ Hide said, cupping Kaneki’s cheek. _“You’ve never been any less human than what you’ve made yourself out to be.”_

“I can’t remember how many people I’ve killed, Hide,” Kaneki said, voice cracking slightly. “How many people have died because of me. I’ve destroyed entire families.”

_“So have I.”_

“I’ve _massacred_ innocent people.”

_“Been there, done that. What else you got, Kaneki?”_ Hide smirked.

“That’s not—We’re not—”

_“The same? That’s a matter of perspective.”_

Kaneki laughed breathily. “You always have some witty comeback to everything I say…”

_“Chalk it up to my big head,”_ Hide said. _“It helps that I’m all in your head, though. Just a little.”_

Without warning, Kaneki found himself laughing again. He cast Hide a longing look and forced a smile that came easier than he expected. A familiar ache in his nose made him glance down at the ground for a moment to gather his bearings. He took a shaky breath and swallowed the tears.

_“Hey,”_ Hide said, thumb brushing against Kaneki’s cheekbone. _“Hey, you’ll be alright. You’ll be okay. We’ll be okay.”_ He gathered Kaneki up in his arms and held him close to his chest. _“Just breathe in, breathe out, like always.”_

“Just breathe,” Kaneki echoed softly.

_“Right. Just breathe.”_

_Just breathe._

In and out, like he always had, ever since Mom died, ever since Hide first taught him to. Inhale and exhale, and slowly but surely, it started to feel easier. Like there was nothing lodged in his throat anymore. He closed his eyes, opened them. Shook off the morning dew.

And then he got up again.


End file.
